Experimental Investigation and Finite Element Analysis on Electromagnetic Compression Forming Processed Aluminum Alloy Tubes

Abstract

Electromagnetic forming (EMF) is a high energy rate forming (HERF) process. It is a high speed forming process using a pulsed magnetic field to form work pieces made of metals such as copper or aluminum alloys with high electrical conductivity. The work piece to be deformed will be located within the effective area of the tool coil so that the resulting type of stress during the forming process is determined by the type of coil used and its arrangement as related to the component. Tubular or structural components can be narrowed by means of compression coils or widened by means of expansion coils, where as sheet metal can be deformed by flat coils. In this work, the experimental investigation and simulation of electromagnetic compression forming of aluminum alloy tubes is studied. The aim of the paper was to verify the results from Finite element methods with experimental data. Experiments were conducted on Tubes of outer diameter 40 mm and wall thickness of 2 mm with a nominal tensile strength of 214 MPa. The tube was compressed using a 4 turn helical actuator discharge that can be energied up to 20 kJ. A field shaper made of aluminum was used. A Maximum reduction of 15.85% in diameters were measured. The same problem was simulated in ANSYS using static coupled electromagnetic analysis. The results of the Simulation showed good correlation with experimental results.